Virtualization can associate computing resources with network services. For example, virtual compute instances, such as virtual machines (VMs), can interact with physical networking equipments providing load balancing service, firewall service, etc., physical equipments providing high level application services, such as, web proxy, Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) proxy, single sign-on proxy, Web Cache Communication Protocol (WCCP) proxy, Internet Content Adaptation Protocol (ICAP) proxy, virtual network appliances providing similar network services to physical networking equipments, and virtual application services that run on an off-the-shelf x86 blade servers.
Virtualization can bring challenges to providers and users of data centers. For example, the interaction between virtual compute instances and resources may require discovery and configuration of the services at management stations in the network. Service discovery and configuration techniques for distributed computer systems with service-consuming clients, such as VMs, are important to ensure that the clients are operating at desired or target levels. However, service discovery and configuration may be a resource and capital intensive operation as it requires multiple organizations inside an enterprise and across different enterprises to interoperate and cooperate with each other and work with all the equipment and virtualization service vendors. In addition, maintaining the service configuration in view of the dynamic nature of the data center service and policy deployment is an increasingly difficult task.